Remote safety firing mechanism



Aug. 9, 1960 P. 1. EVANS ETAL REMOTE SAFETY FIRING MECHANISM Filed March4, 1959 INVENTOR. PAUL I. EVANS MAURICE RRANSOM J ATTORNEYS FlG.3.

. if v i L United States Patent REMOTE SAFETY FIRING MECHANISM Paul I.Evans, Livermore, and Maurice R. Ransom, Torrance, Cal1f., assignors tothe United States'of America as represented by the Secretary of the ArmyFiled Mar. 4, 1959, Ser. No. 797,319

1 Claim. or. 89-28) This invention relates to safety devices such as areadapted to lock the firing mechanism of a firearm in an inoperablecondition, and more especially to a remotely controlled safety devicewhich is readily attached to or detached from the housing of a gun firecontrol mechanism and which is so biased that its failure always leavesthe firing mechanism in a locked or safe condition.

As hereinafter explained in greater detail, a spring loaded stop pin isarranged to lock the sear of the firearm and to be withdrawn fromlocking position by an electromagnet which has its energizationcontrolled from a remote point such as the turret of a tank or the like.

The invention will be better understood from the following descriptionwhen considered in connection with the accompanying drawings and itsscope is indicated by the appended claim.

Referring to the drawings:

Fig. 1 illustrates, partly in section, the general relation between therifle barrel, the housing of the fire control mechanism and the remotelycontrolled safety device,

Fig. 2 shows various details of the fire control mechanism and indicatesits relation to an operating element of the safety device, and

Fig. 3 is a view, partly in section showing various details of thesafety mechanism.

As indicated by Fig. 1, the fire control mechanism of the rifle isenclosed within a housing which is attached to a barrel 11. A safetydevice 12 has a pin 13 which extends through the housing 10 into lockingengagement with a sear release 1.4 (see Fig. 2) which may be operated bya lanyard or other suitable means. The device 12 is fixed to the housing10 by a clamping lever 15 which has at its pivoted end a cam-shapedsurface adapted to force a member 16 into clamping engagement with thehousing 10.

The firing mechanism of Fig. 2 includes a hammer 17, a sear 18, the searrelease 14, and a scar release retainer 19 to which a firing lanyard maybe attached. The sear 18 having a pivot 20, is biased to its illustratedposition by a spring 21 and is arranged to be lockedin its illustratedposition by a lever 22 which has a pivot 23.

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The safety device of Fig. 3 includes an armature 24 of an electromagnetas illustrated. This armature supports the previously mentioned lockingpin 13 and is biased to its illustrated and locked position by a spring25. Surrounding the armature Z4 is a coil 26 of said electromagnet whichhas input leads 27 (see Fig. 1).

When the coil 26 is energized after the locking lever 22 has been movedcounter clockwise from its illustrated safe position, the armature ismoved against the stop 28, thus retracting the pin 13 from its lockingor blocking position and unlocking the sear release retainer 19. Thisallows the sear retainer 19 to be moved clockwise with the sear release14 for releasing the hammer when the gun will fire. As long as the pin13 blocks such movement of the sear release 14 the gun cannot be fired.The 0 ring seals 29 and 30 are provided to prevent foreign material fromclogging the solenoid so as to retard its movement.

As will be appreciated by those skilled in the art, the above describedsafety device has the important advantage that it always fails safesince the pin 13 is always biased into locking engagement with the searrelease retainer 19.

We claim: a

A firing mechanism for a gun of the type having two safety'devices, onemanually controllable and the other electrically and remotelycontrollable, said mechanism comprising a hammer, an L shaped searlocking the hammer against actuation for rendering the gun safe, apivotal support for said sear, one arm of said sear engaging saidhammer, a pivotal locking lever engaging another arm of said sear and bymeans of which the said sear may be manually locked, or unlocked whensaid lever is disengaged from said sear, a spring biasing said sear to alocking position, a sear retainer pivoted adjacent said sear, a scarrelease mounted in said retainer for releasing the sear from saidhammer, said remotely controllable safety device including means forremovably clamping the same to a gun, a housing, anelectrornagnet withinsaid housing and including an armature coaxially mounted within a coilof said electromagnet, a locking pin extension of said armature, aspring cooperating with said housing and armature for biasing said pinto a locking position substantially contiguous to said sear release whensaid pin is extended by said housing spring to a position where said pinblocks any sear releasing movement of said retainer, and when said pinis retracted by said electromagnet the sear retainer and release arefree for sear releasing movement and whereby in event of failure of saidelectromagnet the'pin is moved to its lock-ing position by said armaturespring.

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTSClaytor Oct. 1-2, 1943

